Boycott Autism Speaks

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Please stop trying to use your son's death in such emotionally manipulative ways. And please stop scolding people for not expressing enough empathy for your problems to the exclusion of their own.

I mean you are all over this forum basically saying that most of the people who disagree with you shouldn't even be diagnosed, and that the DSM-5 criteria were written specifically to exclude people like them. You're saying that people who spend time discussing these issues on the internet are wasting time because you incorrectly think that the internet is [url=http://imageshack.us/a/img571/7396/ilny.jpg]not a part of real life. (link)[/url]

Like it is truly honestly legitimately tragic and sad that your son died. But trying to use your son's death to stop people from discussing the issues that affect them doesn't exactly say much for your capacity for empathy, either. We all have problems, not just you.

Anyway, now that you're here, this thread's going to lose a lot of signal and gain a lot of noise. Not worth watching any longer.

Like i frankly told you in the other thread..i am tired of you attempting to slander my credibility here with mistruths..

If you cannot quote where i did these things you accuse me of ..just shut up...

I am not scolding any one individual for not expressing empathy for my son and some people have expressed empathy for him..

But don't you dare tell me what i can or what i can not say about my son here..

That is the lowest thing anyone has said to me on this site yet...

Just do as I've done and don't reply to her posts if there's no value in doing so.

She does have a point or two she's made, especially replying to my post... but she ironically doesn't seem to see that her perceptions and paradigms of the subject matter taint her point of view with a Verdandi shade of bias. ie I get that gay rights aren't gay white male rights (and I never said they were, she projected that pov onto me.) but they're also not Verdandi aspie dyke rights, either.

As for what she's said about your posts about your son, chalk it up to her misperceptions being influenced by her own AS symptoms and don't take it personally - if you do it'll just crate self imposed stress that adds nothing of value to your life.

Fwiw, I think it was worth mentioning what you did about your son and people like him and yourself, I just didn't reply because I didn't know the "right," thing to say and didn't want to create any offence about it. Bit of a touchy subject, I'm sure you'd agree. Nonetheless, your plight is just as valid as mine or Verdandi's or the OP who feels ASD shouldn't be cured. It's just the we each come from a different set of life experiences and points of view, all equally as valid to ourselves. It's just being able to communicate them to one another in a constructive and beneficial discussion sort of way vs. frustratingly trying to convince one another that we're right and they're wrong. I'd much rather have some valuable discussions and debates from multiple perspectives that force opinions upon one another, so if we continue to discuss this.. let's do that; discuss it.

No problem friend..no stress at all for me..just practicing assertive communication..part of my remediation of the no boundaries nice guy part of Autism that is the story of most of my life...

So smiles and thanks for the moral support...

Autism Speaks is to autistic people, what the KKK is to black people, and I'm not exaggerating that. They are a classic hate group. They believe that autistic people are destroying their happiness, and they want us off the planet, so they can be happy again. They talk about murdering autistic children. If you don't believe it, watch their videos.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7NTfZzS9b8[/youtube]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mycxSJ3-_Q[/youtube]

Neither of those videos expressed KKK-on-black-people hate for Autistics.

The first one was a clip from a longer film, and there's no way to know what sort of context it was used in without seeing footage before and after it. Regardless of other footage, with the struggles my own family and others I know deal with, I can see very easily how someone could make those sorts of comments about murder/suicide frustrations after being driven to their wits end dealing with Autism symptoms and their own stress & depression because of it. It's not a nice thing to say, but it is a realistic thought and set of emotions that real people go through while dealing with the daily realities of Autistic relatives. There's nothing wrong, imo, about documenting this on film and playing it back. It's real.

The second video started out with a little over the top cliche fear marketing and just wreaked of fundraising cash grab.. but then it got much better with the loving positive comments made by family and friends of Autistics willing to put in the hard work to counteract the personified Autism boogeyman of the first half of the clip. A bit cheesy with some rather 1980's/1990's production values.. but overall I don't see a problem with people advertising that they're working with a variety of researchers to figure out how to improve the lives of those afflicted by Autism. I say this as someone who's successfully treated my own Autism symptoms and am now beginning to live a fuller and happier life because of it.

No, I didn't say you were wrong. The point is that I would NOT be the same if I didn't have AS. Not even close. And no, not everybody is trying to fit in or pass for NT. I couldn't give a d--- whether I "fit in" with NT society. I function well enough within it, at least in terms of being able to make a living for the most part, but socially -- I truly can't be asked to make the effort. The "reward" of being able to play the NT game socially is just not alluring at all to me.

(By the way -- "IMO" means "in my opinion", in case you didn't know that [seriously] -- I was saying that it was MY opinion personally that liking foods and authors was trivial. Certainly others have different opinions, and that's certainly valid. I wouldn't like you to take offense.)

The KKK comparison is basically terrible and inaccurate.

It doesn't really matter in what context a parent talks about killing a child right in front of that child. It's terrible parenting. It's abusive. Making excuses for her is just accepting that it's okay to talk about the desire to kill autistic children at all.

The loving positive comments do not improve the first part of the video because autism is still with those comments being framed as an enemy to wage war against. It doesn't get better because the first part doesn't go away. It's still part of the video.

I genuinely don't understand why people get so upset at the idea of a cure. You don't have to have it. But you have to admit (at least I would think you would), that life is much more difficult, even simple things, with Autism. If there was a disease that caused babies to be born without hands, sure I could understand how the people grow to adults and cherish their own identity, but would you really want more children to be born without hands? Because that's what I feel like Autism has done to my life. I'm constantly compensating, often poorly, for not having my metaphorical hands.

Well, I agree with that, that there is nothing wrong with Autism Speaks documenting what total monsters these parents are. And they say that autistic people have no empathy?

A neurotypical mother tells her own worthless little autistic daughter, that she would like to kill her and herself by driving their car off a bridge. If it wasn't for the girls wonderful, awesome, neurotypical brother, and you can see where they are coming from? Do I need to provide a list of how many parents have done exactly what that little girls mother wanted to do, and murdered their autistic kids? I don't make any apologies for comparing Autism Speaks to the KKK. They are genocidists, plain and simple. Autism Speaks needs to be shut down, no matter how long it takes.

I disagree. I can't think of a more accurate comparison. Autism Speaks promotes electroshock torture as a way of curing autism. They encourage parents to murder their autistic children, and many parents are doing just that. It is a horrid organization. They are bad and they need to be put out of business.

She made no such murderous comments. She expressed desperation and extreme stress of dealing with the frustrations of Autism to the point that she felt like ending hers and her child's life might be a real option, perhaps her only option. People don't act rationally when they're not thinking and feeling rationally. She was obviously extremely stressed & depressed to have been thinking and feeling in such a way that would make her contemplate those drastic actions. You want others to empathize with your struggles, but can't see that others go through difficulties and deserve the same empathy in return. As for the NT sibling, there's nothing wrong with an NT sibling coming along to bring some balance and harmony to a household. I'd consider the new kid a blessing if it relieved the mothers stress and she could then cope with life & her Autistic child better for it.

From what little I know about Autism Speaks, they sound like an organization determined to improve the lives of Autistic people, plain and simple. I don't condemn them in the slightest bit for wanting Autistic people to be happier, healthier, and live more fulfilling lives. Again, I say this having lived on both sides of the coin. My symptoms were crippling my life last year, I wasn't happy, life sucked. I figured out how to treat myself (a goal of Autism Speaks), have treated myself, and am now happier, healthier, and more productive than ever. I'm all for reducing or eliminating Autistic traits in order to live a better life - and because I've done it, I'm in a unique position to say that it is in fact better & no one can possibly convince me otherwise. There isn't a snowball's chance in hell that I'd voluntarily return to strong Autistic traits ruining my life. Never ever. I'll take treatment & cures over holding onto hinderances as my identity. You can do whatever you wish.

Maybe they do promote electroshock, I have no idea. I have yet to see anything from them promoting the murder of Autistic people. what I do see is that they refuse to accept the debilitating negatives and hinderances of Autism as permanent and incurable, constantly striving for a better way, financing research in multiple directions in order to try to provide some relief to those who suffer from Autism. As someone who has studied process improvements, Japanese industrial engineering philosophies & so forth, I see continuous improvement as The Goal & applaud Autism Speaks for trying new and different things in their own relentless pursuit of improved quality of life for Autistic people and their families. They are good for whomever is interested in treatments, self improvement, a better quality of life etc. They aren't for you if you'd prefer to suffer through the lows of Autism in order to have the benefits of any "gift," traits you may have, and that's your choice to make - but it's certainly not up to you to tell me or anyone else that we shouldn't support an organization that's trying to find ways to improve and enhance our lives IF we want our lives to be improved and enhanced via successful treatments for Autism.

I disagree, they are not a classic hate group but more like a dangerous deluded cult. A classic hate group like the KKK knows they hate blacks and Jews and want to separate from them if not kill them. These people actually think that autism is a satanic like entity destroying their kids by making them different or non human. If you believe something is going after your kid most parents would do anything, no matter what it takes, to protect them, another words the ends justify the means. People are just blinded to the harm they are doing to themselves or others. When that happens boundaries get obliterated and the end result unpredictable and potentially catastrophic. A cult could end like Jonestown mass suicide in 1978 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonestown, death or mutilation by exorcism or genital mutilation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genital_mutilation. In each case people thought they were doing the right thing for the people they grievously harmed or killed.

Most cults are limited in the damage they can do because they are limited in means. This is certainly not the case with Autism Speaks. Most of you will know the biographies of the founders of Autism Speaks, but I won't assume everybody does. Autism Speaks was founded Suzanne Wright wife of Bob Wright. Their grandson was diagnosed with Autism. Bob Wright is a former chairmen of NBC Universal. That makes him a person that will be listened to in the highest corridors of power in the United States. This means Autism Speaks will only get positive publicity in the mainstream media. Autism Speaks probably uses the most effective marketers and fundraisers in the USA. It was mentioned no evidence exists Autism Speaks has anything to do with eugenics research. Of course not. Bob Wright's gravitates in the industry means no mainstream media will ever send their investigative team or even bother to question what happens in their labs. The combination of missionary zeal and political power is what makes Autism Speaks potentially more dangerous then a classic hate group.

Let's look at the two advertisements above. It is classic shock and fear advertising. It does not literally say you should kill your child because he has autism nor it is about that. The idea being sold is that Autism is so bad this poor mother actually considered for a moment or two committing family suicide. The advertisement aims to have listeners think something along the lines of "Oh My God, how shocking. Autism Speaks is against that, they are a good cause let me give them my money". Problem is that like many people here people will misinterpret that to say it is ok to kill your child. Even if Autism Speaks did not want that result, which I don't think they did, they are so blinded they did not consider that possibly or will think of it as unfortunate collateral damage in the cause of the greater good. If they get enough people with power believing Autism is so bad the end justifies the means then the doomsday scenarios being bandied about become reality.

While the power they wield makes it easy to just give up and prepare for doomsday, doomsday is not guarantied, nothing is in life is. No resistance makes doomsday more likely, resistance even if by a tiny amount lessons the odds.



It is certainly my right and indeed duty to tell you that I have a very different take on the organization and why I think it threatens me and many others. My right to an opinion which you support is useless if I can not express it to people. It I do not have a right to express my opinion to others then I do not live in democracy but a dictatorship.

Last edited by ASPartOfMe on 27 Dec 2013, 2:39 am, edited 1 time in total.

I find it funny to compare them to being a cult.. as if they're brainwashing people into wanting treatments or cures. Those that want treatments or a cure don't need to be brainwashed and convinced of it any more than cancer patients hoping to be cured of what ails them. Again, if you don't want treatments that would lessen Autism symptoms and make your life easier, that's up to you.. but to tell me and others that support that that we're being brainwashed by cult leaders is absolutely ridiculous, IMO.

It's by my own free will that I support improving my own life and the lives of others via treatments, science, medicine, therapy, diet & exercise - whatever it takes to strive for continuous improvement and a better quality of life.

And not to beat a dead horse, buuuut I will: I say this as someone who's life was completely crippled by Autism symptoms, I've found treatment methods that reduce/eliminate symptoms, and now am happier and healthier than I've ever been in my entire life. Having a perspective from both sides, I fully support any effort to treat Autism in order for Autistic people to lead happier healthier more fulfilling lives - because I know it's possible and am living it.

Are you in denial, or what?

"I remember that was a very scary moment for me, when I realized that I had sat in the car for 15 minutes and actually contemplated, putting Jody in the car. Driving off the George Washington Bridge, and that would be preferable to having to put her in one of these schools. It's only because of Loran. The fact that I have another child, that I probably didn't do it."

What do you think hearing that from her mother does to a child like that? That is just messed up. It's sick, sick, sick, and Autism Speaks is sick for making that video and others like it.